﻿NORTH SHORE LAC URGES STATE LEGISLATORS TO PASS LOCAL CONTROL BILL TO MITIGATE IMPACT OF HIGH STAKES TESTING AND RELATED CURRICULUM MANDATES﻿

April 7, 2014 -- The North Shore School District Legislative Action Committee (LAC) issued letters to all 191 sitting New York State Senators and Assembly Members to express its strong objection to the manner in which State Education Commissioner John King and the New York State Board of Regents have implemented the Common Core curriculum and related grades standardized assessments in grades 3-8.

The letter calls on each legislator to support Education Bill S3719, which directs the Commissioner of Education “to establish performance standards for school districts for exemption from requirements mandated by the state.” The proposal was introduced by State Senator Carl Marcellino (R,I,C -Oyster Bay), who represents most of the North Shore School District. Assemblyman Edward Ra (R,I,C - Franklin Square), whose district includes portions of Glen Head and Glenwood Landing, has sponsored an Assembly version of the bill, A7778.

The Legislative Action Committee supports legislation that would allow school districts to be evaluated and deemed exempt from certain state mandated requirements based on reasonable performance standards and believes Senator Marcellino’s bill has the potential to provide this.

The effort to push for passage of the legislation at the state level comes in the wake of this past November's adoption by the North Shore school board of a "Resolution on High Stakes Testing" which describes the District’s position with regard to the strengths of North Shore’s education system and the deleterious effects on students, educators and schools of high stakes testing and the associated mandated changes in curricula.

The letter argues that the State’s impetuous implementation of the Common Core curriculum and related testing has created a host of problems, ultimately degrading schools and communities by taking away local control of daily educational decisions. The letter also raises concerns over privacy issues that many New York parents have expressed regarding the Education Commissioner’s plan to turn over extensive student data to the third party company, inBloom, which, they fear may then sell that information to marketers without parental consent.

The Legislative Action Committee was established by the North Shore Board of Education in 2011 to address pertinent legislative issues that affect North Shore and other school districts in New York and the nation.